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Post a Comment On: Doug Ross @ Journal

"The Progressive and the Pencil"

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1:15 PM

Blogger Mike aka Proof said...

"What brought them together and induced them to cooperate to make this pencil?"
When I saw the picture of Barry O underneath this question, I though for a moment that he was taking credit for that, too!

(Pesky typos!)

1:16 PM

Blogger Matt said...

Well, if the government did do it, it would cost $20 a piece, still be sold at a loss, would be in short supply, and would break in 15 seconds.

1:33 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I realized this years ago. That is why when Pelosi, Reid, and Dear Leader Chairman MaObama came into power I started calling them what they are . . . Commiecrats!

2:07 PM

Anonymous Bones said...

Another chapter with this illustration would be tariffs.
Imposed by government for the union campaigned contributors.
It almost always ends badly.

5:09 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

This is straight out of Leonard Read's short article, I Pencil. See:

http://mises.org/daily/4736

Here it is as an eBook:
http://mises.org/resources/5798

6:00 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

My label for these present-day commies is, "NeoFabian".

1:20 AM

Blogger Old NFO said...

Interesting post, thanks for the info, and yeah, the Obamallama threw me too!

7:51 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Yes, this is "I, Pencil", and it's worth reading the actual essay; but Doug's visual summation is perfect and quite wonderful as a quick intro.

3:50 AM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

You mean that Al Gore didn't invent it?

7:20 PM

Blogger Dutch said...

Wish you had used a US made pencil. (Ticonderoga are made in China).

2:56 PM

Blogger Reliapundit said...

great adaptation of MK!

11:06 PM

Blogger Knucklehead said...

Reminds me of the story of the NASA "space" pen which provides another example of profit mongering business beasts using their own resources to develop a solution to a problem. Those darned profiteers just can't keep their noses out of problem solving. Very disturbing, very.

The Internet Myth is that NASA spent millions developing a pen that would write in space conditions. The Soviets used pencils.

The reality is they both used pencils and/or grease pencils. But both of those products present potential hazards in space that are not present on earth; floating broken tips or shavings, flammability in 100% oxygen, etc.

NASA did not spend millions although they did purchase some preposterously priced mechanical pencils.

What did happen is that the Fisher Pen company recognized (or otherwise discovered) an opportunity and developed the space pen all by themselves. Some versions of the story say that Fisher invested approx. $1M developing their ball-point pens before the space pen, others have them spending $1M on the space pen. Either way, they did on their dime and sent the first batch to NASA where they were tested, accepted, and purchased for $6/pen. By both NASA and the Soviet space program, BTW.

Here is the NASA history version:

http://history.nasa.gov/spacepen.html

You can examine the Snopes or other versions if you'd like. Easy enough to google.

11:24 AM

Blogger Larry Geiger said...

Remember, if they spent a million dollars developing it, it wasn't a million dollars to make a SpacePen. It was to develop all of the processes and supply lines needed to make millions of SpacePens and sell them to anyone who wants one for $6.00.

The government would have spent a million dollars and ended up with 5 or 10 pens.

1:33 PM

Blogger Knucklehead said...

Larry,

Well, it would have been 5,000 or 10,000 or so pens (at least one for each congress critter and staff member as well as large campaign contributor) but your point stands and is well taken.

Thanks for pointing it out. It is true that the few hundred pens and thousand or two refills wouldn't recoup Fisher's investment. Patent law and clever marketing took care of that.

2:55 PM

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